


Ultraviolet Light

by wave_of_sorrow



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes (2009)
Genre: Drug Addiction, Drugs, F/M, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-13
Updated: 2010-07-13
Packaged: 2017-10-10 13:06:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/100104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wave_of_sorrow/pseuds/wave_of_sorrow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He is in the darkness before he meets Watson.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ultraviolet Light

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted at my LJ as a response to a Kinkmeme prompt.
> 
> Based on/inspired by U2's "Ultraviolet (Light My Way)" though it's not necessary to know the song to understand this story.

He is in the darkness before he meets Watson, the night is a black cloak around his shoulders, obscuring him, hiding him, protecting him, with him at all times, even in broad daylight, harsh and cruel for the sun knows no mercy. The dark is heavy on his shoulders, weighing down down down, but it is a weight he carries gladly. He is safe here, in the darkness, when he can see everybody else, but no one can see him, his reflection in the looking-glass is blurred even to his own eyes.

 

But then he meets Watson and Watson is bright and blinding and beautiful, like a supernova seen up close, too close, far too close. And suddenly the dark isn’t heavy anymore, instead it glides over his skin with hummingbird softness, like silk and summer rain. He used to think he knew everything about people, but he didn’t. Watson lights his way, makes him realize that he was blind before, makes him see, see all the things he never saw, because they’re beneath the surface, hidden like a pearl, a treasure, a secret. He sees them now. The things he couldn’t see and the things he didn’t want to see. It’s harder now, harder than before, because he has to factor emotions into his equations. And love, yes, love too. And that makes them inaccurate, because love, love is unpredictable and overwhelming and dangerous and a bright light, a Northern Star. And a secret. A secret that is being passed around. A secret that everybody knows.

 

Watson is his light when he’s messed up and has the opera playing in his head and is yearning for the darkness of the cocaine. Or maybe Watson isn’t light. Maybe Watson only makes the light more bearable. Because he is a different kind of light, more blinding and darker, somehow. Less harsh and more revealing. Not as cruel, gentler, in a way. Sometimes he doesn’t know what Watson is. And then, sometimes he feels dirty and used and useless, like trash, thrown away carelessly, and Watson makes him feel clean and cherished and loved. And sometimes he thinks Watson is all he ever wanted without knowing it. They fill the nights with whispers and moans and explosions of ultraviolet light.

 

And then Watson leaves and lights her way instead. In the days before Watson goes to live with her there is silence. Silence during breakfast and silence at a crime scene and silence in the sitting room. And then there is the silence at night, a silence that is different, a silence that comes to a house where no one can sleep; thick, heavy, suffocating, cold and merciless and weighing down down down.

 

He can’t see it anymore now. He is blind, blinded, and Watson doesn’t make him see anymore. Darkness wraps itself around him again and he can no longer see his reflection in the looking-glass. The days are dark and the nights are long and he begs Watson to please, light my way, but he can’t say it and Watson doesn’t hear his silence anymore. And he thinks that maybe, maybe he wasn’t blind before he met Watson, maybe he could see some thingsand was blinded, maybe he was just too close to a supernova, stared at it for too long.

 

Maybe it was the price of love, to go blind.


End file.
